Swan Queen Week: Eighth Day: Dark Horse
by Joshua The Evil Guy
Summary: The World is coming to an End. Again. And only two people can stop it. Thing is, they hate each other and refuse to do what is necessary to save the world. Fortunately for the world, unfortunately for them, the Universe is more stubborn than the Savior and the Evil Queen, and it has ways of getting them to cooperate. Warning: Character-Death... Several Times Over.


Title: Swan Queen Week: Second Sunday: ?

Author: Joshua

Disclaimer: ABC and Disney own Once Upon A Time and all associated characters. This story is in response to the challenge put forth by and for "Swan Queen Week" ( ), specifically the third bi-annual event, "Tropes & Cliches". Story contains descriptions and allusions to an 'Adult' relationship between two women. If this offends you, you always have the right to exercise your free will, and not read it.

Rated: M (for themes, content, and language)

Summary: The World is coming to an End. Again. And only two people can stop it. Thing is, they hate each other and refuse to do what is necessary to save the world. Fortunately for the world, unfortunately for them, the Universe is more stubborn than the Savior and the Evil Queen, and it has ways of getting them to cooperate.

Tropes&Cliche Prompts: (These are the ones among the list that I have decided will be in the following story.)

Time-Loop

Trapped Together

Scary Setting

Rescue-Romance

Apocalypse

Road Trip/Quest

Combined Power/Shapeshifting/Invisible/Hidden Talent

Last Second Win

Character Death

Dark Horse

_8:15 AM_

She awoke. It was an instant transition from sleep to full alertness, though to her, it was merely opening her eyes after having them closed rather suddenly. Dying tends to have that effect on some people. And it sucks.

Sitting up, she immediately started getting dressed and ready for what was to come. Although... there was no 'ready' for what was coming. It was her fourth time through this, and she still couldn't imagine _how_ they were going to come out of this one. She plugged her phone into the charger, knowing she'd need every minute of power she could put into it at one point.

Henry's alarm went off at 8:20 precisely. As usual, Katy Perry's "_Dark Horse_" started playing. It was... bizarre how close some of those lyrics hit to home. Well, Storybrooke-home.

Her cell phone went off thirty seconds later.

"Hey Regina," Emma Swan answered it before the first ring had even finished. "How far did you get this time?"

"Barely ten blocks," the older woman sighed, sounding tired and worn, despite having just woken from a full night's sound sleep the same as Emma just had. The thing was, from their perspective, they'd actually just spent the last week running for their lives and had been up for more than thirty-six hours prior to their 'deaths'. "Ruby—or should I say zombie-wolf Ruby, hunted me down. At least she was merciful and it was quick. This time."

"See, that's what you get for being nice to her before she gets turned," Emma joked, not really feeling the humor, but still feeling the need to try.

"We have less than ten hours before the first one crosses the border, Miss Swan," Regina criticized, "Might I suggest that we spend less time 'making nice' with the people that will be killing us in the near future, and more time preparing for the looming threat. We need to set up bunkers and start sequestering supplies..."

"Bunkering down isn't going to work, Regina," Emma snapped, still getting ready, having put her phone on speaker so she could continue her conversation with the only other person trapped in this hell. "We've tried it the last two times. We either miss something in our defenses and get overrun, or the same thing happens when we inevitably run out of supplies and go out to forage for food an other essentials."

"I was thinking we could go to the monastery this time," the Evil Queen suggested. "The Fairies..."

"The Fairies, or rather the Blue Fairy doesn't trust you without Snow White's explicit command," Emma pointed out. "She wouldn't even let you in to _talk_ the last time! I gotta say, as 'Good' as she and the rest of the Fairies are supposed to be, she is one seriously stuck-up bitch. Nun or no nun."

"Yes, well, they're our best chance at the moment," Regina was forced to admit. Emma began to suspect that some things were beginning to... get to the Evil Queen, even more than they'd been getting to her. For her to pass up a chance at ragging on the 'Superior Blue Bitch', and openly admit that she needed to go to someone else for help, without being backed into the corner of admitting it...

"Regina, are you OK?" Emma asked, picking up the phone and taking it off speaker.

"No, I... I'm not," she answered. It took a few seconds for the normally hyper-observant bounty hunter to catch on, but she finally recognized that her partner's voice sounded like she'd been crying. In fact, it had sounded like that from the first moment of the phone call. Thinking back like that prompted the failed Savior to recall everything _prior_ to her last moments of life.

"Oh my god, Regina, I'm so sorry, I didn't realize, I just woke up and that damned truck got me again and... I should have realized that... He's still alive, you know," she rambled on for a bit.

"I know," the weeping mother replied. "I'm watching him sleep right now. Magic mirror and all."

"Yeah, he always does hit the snooze a couple of times," Emma sighed. "We've got to do something about this Regina. More than just bunker down. Because—quite obviously—this is not just going to blow over. Question is, do we take our chances outside of Storybrooke, or do we stay here where at least magic is still an option?"

"Not that it has done us a lot of good," Regina grumbled. "But there is no way that I am leaving Henry behind, and so far we haven't even been able to go a month without... without... *sob* without..."

"Without losing him," Emma finished for her. "OK, fine. Priority one, making the town safe. Safe enough that you and I can leave and come back. So far, nobody else has even hinted that they're aware of what is going on, and I did this twice before I'd figured out you were in it with me. So until we know better, it's just us, all right?"

"That's fine with me, dear. But understand this, I will not be ordered about like a minion or a sidekick. I am a queen, and you will listen to me and do as I say," she stated.

"Fine," she said back. "In matters of magic, being ruthless, making the hard calls, and the boring parts of raising Henry—like his bedtime and what he eats—I will listen to you and probably even do what you say. But in terms of dealing with people, survival, compromises and saving people's lives, you will listen to me. You don't _have_ to do what I say, but cross the line and I'll kill you myself and our morning conversation here can be me filling you in on what you missed out on. Are we clear, your majesty?"

"... Yes, Sheriff, I believe we understand one another," Regina answered after a rather pregnant pause.

"Good," Emma acknowledged. "I've got all my ammo and mine and David's guns. I'll wake Henry and the others up and start packing up food. I trust that you're doing the same?"

"I have everything in my home already secured," she reported. "It is enough for three people for a month... or thirty people for a little under a week. I hate to admit it, but you're right about the supplies. We'll need to start as soon as possible."

"You get started on that, I'll start getting everyone involved," she said, already tearing open cabinets and finding bags to put everything into.

"Must you?" she couldn't miss the annoyance present in the Evil Queen's tone.

"If we're going to secure the town, yeah," she answered, hoping the person on the other end could hear the annoyance in _her_ tone as well. "And the more people we save, the easier it is for me to control Snow and the others. We don't need any damn 'rescue missions' this time around. Meet at Granny's in an hour?"

There was that annoyed sigh again, but the woman responded. "An hour then. Goodbye, Sheriff."

"See you later, Madam Mayor."

_9:30 AM_

"Emma," Snow said, her voice quiet, stunned in disbelief, "Are you sure about this? It wasn't just some, I don't know, vivid nightmare brought on by a midnight snack or something?"

"Snow... Mom," Emma said, as serious as she'd ever been in her entire life, taking the woman that birthed her by the shoulders. "We. Don't. Have. Time. For. This. The first wave is already on their way and they'll be across the border at exactly five-forty-three. I haven't been there to time it, but it would not surprise me—the way things go—if the first one's foot landed at twenty-one seconds exactly either. And before you say even one word, Grumpy, we've already tried to meet them at the border and keep them from crossing! They're resistant to magic, for starters, so they can cross any magic barriers we put up. And while the whole shooting them in the head thing does actually work, let me point out the math to everybody first of all. The entire population of Storybrooke is in the hundred thousands, not even close to a million. Hell, we barely make half a million, and that is counting children, infants, and invalids! The _FIRST_ wave of these things? Is! In! The! MILLIONS! Plural! We cannot push them back. All we can hope for is to find some place for us all to hide out in, and hope that it is a nut too tough for them to crack."

"What about the Dark One?" someone in the crowd asked. A few others picked up on the question and repeated it. "Yeah! What about Mr. Gold? What about Rumpelstiltskin? Why can't he take care of this with one of his deals?"

"Gold is gone," Emma snapped.

The noise level raised and then lowered suddenly as they all realized that the strongest magic user any of them could even think of, the one being in the entire town that might even stand a chance against something like this, being gone... Well, a few were suddenly a pin drop away from a full scale panic.

"We know this," the brunette at Emma's side finally said something, "because we both, on our own, tried to go to him for help during this. At first, neither of us could get into his shop. The... last time, working together we managed to force our way into both his home and the Pawn Shop. Rumpelstiltskin is gone, and from the looks of things he's not coming back, and certainly not to save us. So stop your quibbling and let's get started, shall we?"

"Regina," Emma cautioned, putting a hand on her partner's shoulder. "She's right though. We can't count on Gold, and Belle is nowhere to be found, same for Neal or anyone else that we could count on to be Gold's conscience in this. We need to start preparing here, people."

"What have you already... we, already done?" Snow chimed in.

"We've already tried securing City Hall, the Hospital and individual homes, my own among them," Regina spoke up. "It is my... hope, that in the face of this crisis, the Fairies might be willing to open their doors and we could try the monastery this time. Between that and the hospital, we _might_ be able to at least gain some footing to leverage ourselves against."

"Who asked you, sister?" Grumpy shouted at the Evil Queen.

"Look!" Emma shouted over the cries of the crowd that were only just beginning. "I don't know what is going on anymore than you all do! But the facts are the facts, and unless somebody here is holding out on us, Regina is the only other person caught up in this! This... attack comes and we are overwhelmed before the sun sets today. We haven't bothered doing the numbers, but it is pretty clear that more than half the town is slaughtered, either eaten or... infected, in just the first few hours. After that, it is a steady decline, to the point where we're counting survivors instead of the dead. And it is a very small number. All I know is that after today, when I die, I wake up in bed, this morning, at eight-fifteen on the dot. And Regina is right there with me. Dying, and waking up today. Anybody else that can say the same, I offer you the floor. Go ahead and recriminate Regina for past choices. Blame me for not saving the day already. Everybody else? Shut the hell up."

The entire diner was silent at this point. Nobody dared say a word, and after that outburst, everyone believed them about what was coming.

"What do we need to do?" David asked, already strapping on his sword.

"We need supplies," Regina ordered.

"And we need Blue Fairy to pull the stick out of her ass and let Regina help this time around," Emma said to her mother. "What's done is done. Good and evil don't matter right now, and won't for a while to come. All that matters right now..." she looked out the window at the approaching storm, lightning already beginning to flash, "... is survival."

_6:00 PM_

It had come just as they said it would. The Attack. The Onslaught. The Plague. The Apocalypse. Everyone called it by a slightly different name. Emma dubbed it, in honor of the first—and last—song she heard of the day; the Dark Horseman. Nobody could really accept what was happening, and so they refused to call it by what it so clearly was, simply because Hollywood had hyped it up so much that the merest possibility of such a thing happening in real life, even to a bunch of Fairy Tale Characters, forced many to shut down into a denial syndrome that put Emma to shame, even when compared to how she'd been when she'd first arrived in Storybrooke and presented with mounting evidence of the Truth.

So nobody dared utter the 'Z' word at all.

Some people... some _heroes_ refused to give up without a fight, or at least trying to make a stand. While Emma and Regina were securing the Monastery and the Hospital, a few fighters made their way to the main street border to make their final stand, intent on stopping this threat to their home and return the conquering heroes. Unfortunately, only about a thousand of the things came in along the road. The rest made their way through the forests and up along the coast. The only direction that was 'safe' was the ocean, and there weren't enough boats for everyone, and Grumpy was one of the heroes that decided to make a stand at the border.

Emma couldn't even say if their sacrifice had managed to buy them any extra time or not, because as before, by the turn of the hour, there were mobs of running and feasting and shambling corpses throughout the entirety of Storybrooke.

She shot Little John in the head. They had to make every bullet count, so only she, Hook, David, and Robin Hood had guns.

Robin shot her a look and nodded at her, tears streaming down his face, mixed with sweat.

She knew he'd wanted to be there at the border with the rest of his Merry Men, but his priorities would always lie with his son, Roland. The children were everyone's first priority.

The zombies were massing at the gates of the Monastery, and according to the radio, outside the sealed doors of the Hospital. The only thing really keeping them out at this point was the triple-layer magical barrier that had been placed over each location. The first ward was pure dark magic, something that Regina had procured from Gold's Shop helped put it up, but that was all Emma knew about it beyond what it did. Best term she could come up for it was 'Fire Wall'.

Pretty much anything, dead or alive, that touched it was roasted on the spot. Flames came from the air itself and worked to consume the target to ash. It was powered by the surrounding magic in the air rather than the caster, so—hopefully—as long as magic remained in Storybrooke, that particular ward would stay in effect.

The second was good magic, or to be more specific, Fairy magic. It was dual-purposed as she understood these sort of things. One, it drew in the surrounding magic _through_ the first ward, sort of empowering both itself and the first defense. And two, it repulsed and repelled, pushing back against any that attacked it with equal force. Unlike the first, which was target specific, this ward could handle multiple targets with ease, even if it was being attacked from every conceivable direction at once—even on the inside.

Finally, the third ward was something a bit more complicated, but far more blunt, to here Regina talk about it. Short and sweet of it was that it was basically just an invisible wall. Even simpler, its only stipulation and distinction was that it only stopped the 'dead'. Nothing that was not alive or a part of something that was alive (like clothes and etc) could pass this ward. The complicated bit came in how both Regina and the Blue Fairy tried to describe what kind of magic it was. The only thing that Emma really understood about it was that it was neither dark magic, fairy magic or light magic, but something else entirely that was still magic.

She decided to put such reflections out of her mind until later, and focus more on blowing the heads off of walking cannibalistic corpses.

The protections were holding. For now. But there were literally thousands, and growing into _millions_ of things out there, and nobody was getting any sleep tonight until those things settled down, and that wouldn't be until there was at least a mountain of non-moving bodies between them and the undead. Hence why they were shooting guns out into the seething mob, as well as using whatever else worked.

There'd been no way to get everyone inside either the Monastery or the Hospital in time. The priority went to the children, of course, but there just wasn't time, or room, for the entire population of Storybrooke. At best guess, they'd probably managed to save... somewhere between one and two thousand people, most of them children or Hospital Staff. The rest were left to fend for themselves in their own homes or wherever they could find shelter. So there were a lot of familiar faces out there that she was shooting down in the name of survival.

By nightfall, Emma could see that they had their mountain of bodies, but the overall mob was not thinning in the least. You say the word 'millions' and you think you know what it means. Until you actually see and face off against that number in real physical bodies in front of yourself, and it takes on a whole new meaning. Emma suddenly understood what some meant when they talked about 'endless' enemies.

She stopped firing when they ran out of ammunition.

None had made it past even the first defense, and the Hospital was likewise unbreeched. The night was lit by the unholy glow of burning corpses flying all around the place and outside the walls. But if it was this easy, she and Regina wouldn't have died nearly half a dozen times by now.

_11:55 PM_

"How are we doing on supplies?" Emma whispered in the tight confines of the Mother Superior's office. This was where the 'Round Table' had gathered. Counting, or rather including Emma and Regina, there were Emma's parents, Snow White and Prince Charming. Granny and Red. Doc, Happy, Doppy, and Tiny (all that remained of the Dwarves). Geppetto, though his son was with the other children at the moment. Archie. The Blue Fairy, of course. And Robin Hood.

"We've taken stock, and set up rationing," Blue answered, speaking for the Fairies. "At present, with food, medicine, water, and other amenable items, we can last out a minimum of thirty-three days. And that is stretching things to one meal a day for every person, and only the lightest and simplest to treat of injuries."

"The Hospital is in better condition as far as medicine and basic supplies," Red spoke up. "But where food is concerned, they're a lot worse off than we are. They can only last ten days, and then they're out of food. Same rationing system, by the way." She'd been the one manning the radio and keeping in touch with Whale and the other survivors at the Hospital.

"We're out of ammunition," Emma said in the wake of that good news. "In the future, Regina, remind me next time that we only use guns for our inevitable FUBAR rescue missions and supply runs."

"Duly noted, my dear," Regina smirked.

"How are the barriers holding up?" Snow asked suddenly.

Blue and Regina both grimaced. Regina was the one that decided to actually answer, but only because that the Fairy leader never would. In that—and only that way—were they similar, both refusing to publicly acknowledge a weakness.

"They're holding. For now," she sighed and rubbed her temples, a pounding pain echoing throughout her skull. "The first ward has been taking the brunt of the damage so far. Unfortunately, while I set it to tap into the surrounding magic, it has already burned through half its allotted energy. There is a reason that every castle in our land didn't have magic barriers like this set up, you know. They are prohibitively costly, not just in setting up, but in maintaining them. They way things are going now, the first ward, at both locations, will fall around, or just before noon. The Hospital first, here second. After that..."

"Pinball city," Emma gave a dry laugh. "Not that it'll do us any good any more. Unless they fall just right to bust open the skull, broken bones don't even inconvenience these things. How long can that one last?"

"Maybe twice as long as the first one has," Regina answered. "And we've seen what those things do to standard magical barriers, and the final barrier is just a modified variant of those."

"Why? What happened? Happens?" Snow asked, confused.

"It makes it look like they're walking through quick-drying cement," Emma answered her mother, "but it doesn't stop them. We've got a little under a week before those things get in here. We need to get out of here."

"Where should we go?" Geppetto asked, sounding desperate. He'd just gotten his son back and he didn't want to risk losing him all over again so soon.

"The ocean?" David suggested, shrugging.

"Storybrooke doesn't have a ship big enough for even all the children, let alone even one of the bunkers survivors," Regina argued.

"What about the mines?" Tiny offered.

Emma's eyes lit up, and then quickly dimmed as she shook her head. "That could be a good idea, Anton. For next time around this mess. Those things aren't spreading all over just to spread out. They're swarming. Because this is where their food is. If we start moving people to the mines, they'll just follow us there. And we'll have this same situation, but with fewer resources and fewer... people. How long would it take us to build a boat that could feasibly hold everybody? Using magic to help?"

"Too long," Regina answered before anyone else could. "Especially with our dwindling resources, and to conjure something that large using just magic would drain what we've put into our current defences, running our time down from days to hours. And anything we constructed would still be incomplete and out of our reach."

"Well, what about for next time then?"

"Emma, what are you talking about?" Snow asked, concerned.

"Don't bother trying to explain it to them, my dear," Regina interjected before Emma could say anything else. "While there are past examples of seers and prophets from our land, the possibility of time travel, of any sort, has been deemed utterly impossible. Whatever is happening to us, I doubt magic is responsible, and if it is, then it is a level of magic that no one here has any comprehension of. Making plans for 'next time' is all well and good, but I'm not yet ready to give up on 'this time'."

"Fine, fine, fine, sorry," Emma held up her hand is surrender.

"What are you two talking about?" David asked.

"Show of hands, who here remembers seeing the movie called 'Groundhog Day' starring Bill Murray?" Emma then raised her hand while looking around the table. Nobody else did. "Never mind then. Carry on."

Deciding to label everything they'd just witnessed as yet another quirk of their Savior, everyone at the table went on and did exactly that. And thus Emma and Regina were witness to the *exact same* planning meeting that happened every time the Round Table managed to survive the initial onslaught and tried to treat this as 'just-another-obstacle-to-overcome' like they usually did. It was during this meeting that Snow insisted they send out rescue teams to save any lingering survivors, and Blue and a few others talked about the needs of survival. Together they'd seen it twice already, though it was Emma's fifth time witnessing now.

It was why Emma and Regina had tried to hijack the meeting early on, hoping to move things in a new direction, maybe hoping that by presenting enough new information early enough on that some new ideas might be generated. The mines were a good start, but it just wasn't feasible to get everyone down to them at this juncture. And now they were back to the path that had gotten them killed the last four times already.

_4:00 PM DAY 02_

The only good part, Emma privately decided, of this whole time loop thing was that she weren't limited to one day at a time. The future was the future, time moved on, tomorrow did come... until they died, and it started all over again. For that one anyway. They'd already seen that both Emma and Regina could 'live on' past the others death, but no matter how long it took before the other died to join the first, they both went back to the same point, eight-fifteen on Day Zero. Or Z-Day, as the blond thought of it.

They had yet to get to Day Thirty to even test if they wanted to add in 'months' to the calendar.

Things had been quiet the past few days. Tense, but quiet. Their defences held, though the first line had failed exactly when and how Regina had predicted, and the threat still loomed before them, practically to the horizon, but—for the moment—people were safe and together and with their loved ones. And that was all that mattered.

Emma could no longer sit still.

"We've got to try something, Regina," she hissed, huddled down into 'their' corner, where the two women often bunked with Henry either between them or at the least very close by. "They're going to try their idiotic rescue mission any time now! We've got to do _something_!"

"Careful, my dear," she gave a half smile that never came close to reaching her eyes. "I'm being a bad influence on you. And did it occur to you that maybe that is their reasoning as well? To just _do_ something, rather than wait for the inevitable? Would it make a difference if it were a supply run you were going out for instead of to look for survivors?"

"Maybe... No," she grumblingly admitted. "And you're right, of course. So, about my boat idea?"

"When you come up with a version that allows us to protect our people without taking from what they already have defending them, I'll listen," the Evil Queen snapped, though she did keep her voice down. "Until then, keep thinking on your own time."

"And the mines?"

"As you said, a good idea... for the next time around."

"What would our first step be?" Emma asked after a moment of silence to think the problem over in her head.

"There are two ways into the mines," Regina finally answered with a heavy sigh. Recent stress was taking a toll on her. "The main entrance you already know about. And the elevator into Maleficent's lair."

Emma sat up. She held her tongue until she was sure that she wouldn't begin shouting out loud and glanced around to make sure no one was close enough to overhear. Then she asked, "Could we count her as an ally in this? Would she... could she help us?"

Regina looked up and glanced at the bane of her existence while simultaneously was her only point of sanity amidst all this craziness. "Normally, yes. She understands even better than I do about desperate times calling for strange bedfellows. But she can't leave her lair. And we've both pissed her off plenty."

"Any chance she might be caught up in the time loop too?" she asked, hopeful.

"There is no way to find out either way. From her perspective, every day is the same to her already. And she isn't exactly in a form that one can easily converse with. So, say we got to her this time, and then we go back on the first day again. She would attack us the same either way, and there is no communicating with her when she is this angry."

"What if she just keeps killing us over and over again?" Emma half-joked.

"Then why would she want to stop?" Regina argued back.

"Fair point," the blond was forced to admit. "But does that mean we shouldn't try at all?"

The black-haired sorceress bit her lip and looked away. Whether it was from trying not to laugh, or anger, or some other shameful emotions she didn't want anyone to see, the Sheriff could not tell. Either way, the mask was back in place and on full when she once again deigned to meet her blue eyes with cold brown eyes.

"Let me at least say goodbye to Henry first?" she begged, her voice dead.

"We'll both say goodbye and we'll tell everyone that needs telling," Emma confirmed. "And... Regina? I know I joke about it and everything, about how we're in some kind of twisted time loop, but I'm affected by this just as much as you are."

"Are you? Are you really?" the Mayor snapped, eyes blazing.

Emma let her own mask drop, the one of business-as-usual-optimistic-realist that she'd had on display since this whole mess began, just for an instant, but she looked into the Evil Queen's cold brown eyes and showed her true feelings for that one instant. And then the mask was back up.

Regina gasped. Her black, twisted heart very nearly broke at what she'd just seen. And people complimented her about how well she controlled her emotions? Bah! Emma Swan was in a whole other league when it came to hiding true intentions and emotions. But then, one would expect someone who can spot liars so easily to be an excellent liar herself.

"Fine," she said to cover up her own sign of weakness, grateful that her partner let it pass. "Lets just get this over with. Have you had any luck in finding additional ammunition or a replacement gun for yourself?"

"No," she admitted as they both got to their feet and headed toward the chapel, where most of the 'heroes' gathered during the day. "But I'll be taking David's sword. He somewhat insisted."

"So I take it you've already shared this idea with your parents?" she asked, sounding disgusted by the notion.

"No, it's just every time so far that I've gone out and he's stayed here, he insists I take his sword," she said with a laugh. Regina just rolled her eyes and sighed.

_7:07 PM DAY02_

Needless to say, there was a bit of an argument about Emma and Regina's plan to scout out Maleficent's lair and the possibility of moving the survivors down into the mines. Primarily from all the ones that wanted to go with them. It took Emma insisting and playing the Savior card, and Regina insisting and playing the fireball card before everybody was in agreement. That, of course, took time. Yet, once the decision was made and weapons handed out, (as predicted, David insisted that Emma take his sword), and goodbyes said (though Henry insisted he tell them 'See You Later' and vice versa), there was nothing left to do but go.

It was too dangerous to lower the wards or even attempt the journey above ground. At least not where they were already massed. Unfortunately, Storybrooke didn't exactly have the New York sewer system. And while there were maintenance tunnels, none of them came as far as the Monastery. There was, however, a cellar that connected to the church's catacombs. That cellar was in the house 'normally' assigned to the Head Priest and his family. Of course Storybrooke's "church" had never had a Head Priest, so it remained an empty house. But it was a house that was just outside the Monastery grounds, and therefore outside the wards.

It took them about an hour to navigate the catacombs to the cellar, getting lost twice along the way and having to backtrack almost all the way back to the church itself. When they broke through the wall in the cellar, both women winced and waited for at least two full minutes, to see if the noise had attracted the attention of anything. Hearing nothing but the sound of their own heartbeats, they quietly crept up to the main floor of the house. There was nothing in the house but them, and while they could see the horde through the windows from where they were, none were close enough to see inside the house. And so long as they kept the house between them and the horde, at least until they made it to the treeline, they hoped they'd be OK.

Not a word was spoken between the two women as they stealthily made their way through the woods to the center of town. There were plenty of close calls along the way. The damned things were in the woods, but those farther away from the Hospital and Monastery were at least a bit more passive. While they would drop everything to sniff out and hunt down prey, they weren't running around looking for them specifically. More like they were shambling along and if they happened to come across something they could eat, they would hunt that down, but certainly no intelligent behavior on any of their parts.

Emma got to live out an old fantasy from when she'd been a fan of the Highlander TV series, and decapitated a human body in a single stroke. Fortunately the thing was really decayed and apparently it hadn't 'fed' in a while as there was almost no blood at all. Regina, on the other hand, conserved her strength, as Emma had not been lying when she called these things magic resistant! Shoot them with a fireball, and it went out before doing much more than charring their skin. An ordinary person hit with one of the Evil Queen's fireballs would be instant ash, barely having enough time to scream. So she was carrying an aluminum bat and got to relieve some stress by—literally—caving some heads in.

By the time they made it to Main Street, they'd both racked up enough kills that they could easily shoot down anyone at either the Hospital or Monastery that tried to brag about how many undead they'd "killed", no matter their number. Fortunately, any time they had attracted the attention of additional undead, they'd managed to either take them all out fairly quickly, or lost them in the trees and by ducking through various houses along the way.

Main Street itself was fairly deserted. Aside from themselves, they could only see half a dozen of the shambling corpses, and each of them scattered in different directions. Unfortunately, two were between them and the clock tower/library.

Communicating as silently as possible, through hand motions and mouthing certain words to one another, they coordinated means of taking them out simultaneously, and then breaking for the clock tower as fast as they could. Once they each understood their role and needed action, they set out to do it, as there was no telling when other zombies would come ambling by.

And of course, because it is them and because this is Storybrooke, and partly because it was night, things went wrong right off the bat.

Emma made a little bit too much noise as she snuck up behind her zombie (too decayed to say anything beyond it used to be a man, so there was that to be thankful for) and it was alerted to her presence before she could do the stealthy sword strike she'd been planning. Fortunately, the sound of loose gravel being kicked up doesn't travel very far. A zombie 'roaring' as it expelled breath to lurch the rest of its corpse, now that sound carries. So while she didn't get to pull off the silent stealth ninja kill she'd been aiming for, Emma was still close enough that it was quick and simple work to lash out and decapitate the thing at the neck. After that, the body collapsed and just lay there, though the head was still twitching, most people don't realized exactly how many muscles are in and around their neck, so it couldn't even open and close its jaw anymore.

That—as much as anything—convinced both Emma and pretty much everybody else that they were not dealing magical zombies. Magic pretty much ignored the rules laid out by scientists when it came to physics and biology, instead following its own damn rules. She'd seen and heard of decapitated heads talking and moving on their own, and supposedly there had been... incidents of magicians trying to bring the dead back to life, one of those 'Big No!' rules of magic that everyone kept trying to break, with partial 'zombie' successes. In all cases, taking off the head does nothing. So whatever this was, whatever they were dealing with, it was not of magic. Exactly what it was, Emma wasn't about to try guessing.

Enough philosophizing.

Looking up from her kill, she saw that Regina had likewise been unable to accomplish her silent kill, and was currently peppering the thing with fireball after fireball. Glancing over the situation, she could see the aluminum bat laying on the ground behind the zombie, and scuff marks and bits of gravel on Regina's pant legs and hands. So, apparently she'd tripped, dropped the bat, the sound attracts the undead, and she falls back on her default leading to the current predicament.

She took all this in while already running toward the rotting corpse... damn, it was Grumpy. At least Snow wasn't here this time. She didn't have an angle to get at his neck, but luckily she was coming up behind him. She tried to signal to Regina to stop wasting her energy, but either she was too scared or really didn't see her coming up with the sword. Oh well, recriminations later, zombie-killing now.

Emma drove the point of the sword into the zombie-dwarf's unprotected back, and then she pulled it down and out, felt as the blade scraped along and even cut into the spine a little bit. Grumpy 'Z' paused, grunted, and continued shambling along like he'd only gotten tapped on the shoulder... while Regina continued to pepper him with fireballs. What the hell _were_ these things? Cut off the head or damage the brain—the things stay dead, cut off the connections _to_ the brain so at the very least it should collapse to the ground to make it easier to cut the head off... and it keeps moving like it had gotten a paper cut! Seriously, what the fuck?!

The blond shook her head, lined up and swung as hard as she could, giving a bit extra because Grumpy was known for having an incredibly thick neck. The body finally collapsed, but Regina was still throwing fireballs.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Regina! It's me!" she hissed, getting the terrified woman to calm down enough she she wasn't constantly attacking anymore. "It's all right, I got him. He's down. Let's get in the damn clock tower before anymore show up, all right?"

She was speaking as gently, yet as urgently as she could, approaching the crying and nearly hysterical woman like one might a wounded animal. Very, very carefully.

When she finally reached her, she was still in the midst of erecting her walls and shoring them back into place. Emma would've loved to permit her the time to do so, but they just did not have the time! Physically picking the dark haired woman up, she took them over to the fallen bat, put it securely into her hands and then ran the rest of the way to the clock tower, stealth be damned. Not that it made any difference. Already, they could see hordes coming from two different directions along the streets.

The doors were locked. And not just locked, but chained and padlock locked. Holding the iron chain up, she looked to Regina hopefully, and said, "You got something for this right? Because it is going to take me thirty seconds to find anything to use as a pick, another ten seconds to fashion them, and another three and a half minutes to unlock this monster, not counting the full ten seconds it'll take to unwrap this thing and then rewrap it to keep those things out. That's five minutes that we _do not have_ Regina!"

"Just... just give me a second," she said, still a bit unsteady, staring down at the iron locks.

"You've got twenty," Emma told her honestly, eyeballing the approaching hordes. They could still make the treeline and try again tomorrow... _IF_ they left within the next thirty seconds. An idea struck her suddenly. "Could you just poof us inside? Forget the lock and the door, we actually want them that way. Can you get the two of us the three feet necessary on the other side of this door?"

"If it hasn't been warded..." she started to explain.

"Assume that it hasn't," Emma said, more urgently now. "We either get inside right now, or we make a break for it, Regina. Decide."

"I... oh here!" she folded under the sudden pressure and waved her hand. The chains and lock vanished and the doors opened on their own. Neither of them said a word, the Sheriff roughly pulled the Mayor inside the clock tower and thankfully the doors closed behind them. Double fortunate, the chains and lock reappeared where they'd been in a cloud of purple smoke. Unfortunate, one of the zombies was close enough to see it and made a beeline for the clock tower, drawing in the others with it.

"Let's move this stuff, try and block them," Emma suggested, moving a book-filled cart over to the door and then tipping it over so it wouldn't be rolled out of the way. "Regina? Help me!"

"Right, of of course," she stammered, apparently still out of it.

"Deal with it later, Regina," she snapped. "Focus on the here and now. Deal with what happened when you have time to deal with it." A decayed fist was shoved through the glass of the door, which was fortunately pretty high up so it was only as much as part of the forearm and hand, but it was very motivating. "Which is not now! Can you move those bookcases?"

"I won't have much left to deal with Maleficent," she cautioned.

"One threat at a time," she said, while still moving things to create a barricade behind the door. "Zombie attack first. Once we either stop them or slow them down enough, you can rest in the elevator. After that, we can wait as long as you need before facing the dragon. Who I really hope isn't a zombie dragon. We _really_ don't need that."

"All right," she said, reluctantly. "Get out of the way."

Once the blond had moved hack to beside the brunette, she waved one arm and half the nearest bookcases flew to barricade the front door, the rest going to the windows that had already been breached. It bought them maybe an extra thirty seconds, a minute at the most, given the pounding on the metal door and the sound of breaking wood.

"Let's get to that elevator," Emma stated. Regina compliantly nodded her head in agreement.

Two minutes later, the 'wall' was up and they were both inside the hand-crank elevator.

"You sure that you can get it to lower us down safely, and not drop us?" Emma asked one final time as she shut the gate.

"Yes," the Evil Queen answered tersely rather than rebuke her for doubting her power. It just showed how out of it she really was. Emma chose not to say anything more on the matter and locked the door and waited for the magic to happen.

Regina waved one hand and the wall closed up in front of them. She twitched her wrist and the elevator started up and they began to drop. It was a familiar drop to Emma though, so she knew that they were OK for right now. Two minutes of extremely tense silence later, and they reached the bottom. The lights of the elevator cut out, but that was actually standard when it was no longer in use. Neither woman made to open the gate.

After about five minutes or so, Emma sighed and then moved over to one corner and sat down on the floor. She still didn't say anything. Neither did Regina, who was struggling not to just break down and cry right there. She very well might have—if she were alone. As it was, with her current audience, she remained stoically steadfast and upright, almost at attention.

Ten minutes later, Emma finally broke the silence with, "Are you sure standing still is helping you rest and regain your strength? I would've thought sitting would be more comfortable."

"I thought we were waiting on you to work up your nerve," Regina retorted.

The blond grinned. She was back. Getting to her feet, she unsheathed the sword and asked, "So, are you ready for this?"

"Are you?" the question was ominously put forth.

"No," she answered honestly, and then unlatched the gate and opened up the elevator.

Regina shook her head and followed the warrior out into the dragon's lair.

As it turned out, Maleficent wasn't part of the time loop. She was a floating hag instead of a dragon this time around, but cursed that way by Regina rather than from whatever zombie virus thing was going on. And apparently she didn't really have issue with bringing the townspeople down into her lair in order to access the mines and the safety they could provide. On the provision that Regina _apologize_ to her.

It got real iffy there for a few minutes, but as she'd stated previously, desperation makes for strange bedfellows, and the Evil Queen swallowed her pride and apologized to her oldest friend. It was clear that it was not easy for her, but it did the job and Maleficent was transformed into a pretty blond lady wearing purple rags that probably was once a regal dress. She showed them to the mines and instructed them on the quickest way out.

They'd followed those instructions and quickly came upon an all too familiar elevator. It was the one that Henry and Archie had been trapped in down here three years ago. Emma had put forth the question, but Regina was already answering, "The new Curse. It restored _everything_ about Storybrooke. Including this elevator. This elevator that could not even lift a ten year old boy and a two hundred pound stick of a man, soaking wet. We're trapped."

"Maybe not," Emma had countered, rather than ask the question she'd already gotten her answer to. "We can climb. It's not ideal, but there are crossbeams for handholds, and I think I see a metal rung ladder along one side of the shaft, and..." she was interrupted from saying anything further by the body falling down said shaft and through the roof of the old mining elevator. "_FUCK_!"

"Miss Swan, I will not have you speaking such language. Especially not around Henry," Regina reprimanded her.

"Henry's not here," Emma started to say, but was interrupted as the fallen body started to get back to it's feet. "Oh shit."

"Miss Swan," Regina began, but was likewise interrupted by another falling body. "Oh _shit_!"

"Run now, berate me later!" Emma shouted, striking like a viper with her sword, getting one across the neck and the other with an upward thrust through the soft part under the jaw into the brain. The women were already down the tunnel before either body finished collapsing.

After that, things got more interesting, until they finally found a viable exit. Unfortunately, the horde had found it too. Then it was just chaos. Violent, ugly, bloody chaos.

"Regina!" Emma shouted when she lost site of her in the crowd of bodies. She was a bloody sword-swinging machine at this point, kicking when it was less convenient to use her weapon, not that it did much good when her target wasn't the head.

She cut a swath through the undead to the last spot she'd seen the Mayor. These things knew no fear, so they weren't intimidated in the least by how many of them she was taking down. They just kept coming. The only thing that even slowed them down was the press of bodies actually limited their movement and kept some of them from getting close enough for a bite. In other words, they were getting in each others way and didn't even care.

"Regina!" she cried out again the moment she spotted the woman, lying prone on the ground, her head bowed and hair covering her face. She only hoped it wasn't too late. She swung and managed to get three at once. It gave her a small window in which to leap in and put herself between the vulnerable woman on the ground and the main press of bodies. "Come on! Regina!"

The black-haired lady tossed her hair back and tear-streaked brown eyes looked up and saw the clenched body of the blond warrior in her red jacket, swinging her sword and kicking out to push them all back again and again. She was stunned.

Emma was just relieved that it wasn't too late.

"We've gotta get out of here!" she yelled at her partner, pulling her to her feet with one hand while she continued to slash with the other. Her current strategy was to keep them bumping into each other, enough to halt their advance just long enough that they could figure out where to go.

"I can teleport us out of here!" Regina yelled, taking Emma by the arm and shoulder.

"Whenever you're ready! Anytime is—"

_8:45 PM DAY02_

"—good!"

Emma stopped and looked around as the purple smoke surrounding them dissipated. They were in Gold's shop. And there were no zombies ransacking the place, so call it a win.

"Did they break the skin?" Regina suddenly asked, pulling Emma close and giving her a thorough examination there in the middle of the floor. Knowing the seriousness of the situation, the blond immediately started helping her.

"I don't think so. Just scrapes and scratches. No bite marks and I know what a zombie bite feels like. Didn't feel anything," she said while looking herself over. "You?"

"They knocked me to the ground when they surged," the dark haired sorceress told her. "I had to use magic to hold them off. I..." she choked up a little bit, and Emma could see she was trying to keep it together, but she knew firsthand that some things could not be denied. "You saved me."

"What?" Emma wasn't quite sure what she'd said there.

"You saved me," Regina looked into her blue eyes, tears streaming down her face. "Why? Why would you do something like that? Why risk... everything to save me? Even... you know that we'll just do this all again. It gains you nothing to do something like that and save me. You could just go and save yourself but... you saved me... Why?"

Emma just shrugged, not understanding what the big deal was. "You were in trouble. You're my, I don't know, my friend, the mother of my son, my partner in all of this. Whatever the case may be, you were in trouble and I was not about to just stand by and watch you get killed. Not when there was anything I could do about it."

"I would," the Evil Queen said darkly.

"I know that," the Savior replied easily. "And I'll always save you."

The tearful brunette recoiled at the words slightly, prompting the blond to continue.

"Remember our first time?" she teased. "We were in the middle of an argument, you were winning, as usual, and then there was an explosion and a fire. You twisted your ankle and couldn't move. I went for a fire extinguisher and you grabbed me and accused me of leaving you behind. Then I came back and pulled you to safety. I saved you then. I've saved you a few times since then. I saved you just now. Regina," she took a step closer so they were face to face, "I will always save you."

Rather than recoil, the Evil Queen suddenly looked rather sick, as she muttered, "Oh god. This is going to be our thing now, isn't it?"

"What thing?" Emma asked, thoroughly confused now.

"Your idiot parents, they go on and on about finding each other," she answered. "It's their... thing, that they do. This is our thing now. You saving me and... I need to sit down."

Before anything else could happen, there was a crashing sound from the back room, and they could see the horde approaching the shop through the front windows. Pulling Regina close, Emma said, "No time for that now. Break is over. We've got to make a break for the tree line, try and get to the Hospital. It's closer."

"Aren't hospitals and zombies a little cliché?" Regina mumbled as they grabbed what weapons they could and ran out the front door.

_11:57 PM DAY02_

"No," Emma gasped, horrified. She wasn't the only one.

"How could this have happened?" Regina waled, staring. "They... he should have been safe. I don't understand, they... how? Emma, how?"

"I don't know," the tearful blond was shaking her head. "It didn't happen like this before, it, I, I just... don't know, Regina. I don't know."

The Monastery was overrun. So was the Hospital, which is why they'd risk coming back to the Monastery in the first place. If there were any more survivors, they were either hiding or about to die or joining the ranks of the undead.

Currently the two women stood on the roof of the Priest Home that contained the cellar access to the catacombs. The house was now overrun, but not from the undead swarming in from the outside. No, they were coming up out of the basement, out of the cellar, from the catacombs. Meaning that the Monastery was entirely overrun.

"We have to find Henry," Emma suddenly declared.

"If the wards are still up—" Regina started to protest, but Emma interrupted her.

"Are they?"

"What?" the dark haired sorceress seemed insulted and horrified both at once.

"Are the defenses even still up? I mean, take a look around, your majesty? Something went wrong, and the only thing keeping those things out were the magic protections we trusted to keep everybody safe! So either the magic failed, or..." she trailed off, not able to even finish the sentence.

"Or somebody let them in," Regina finished the thought, though it pained her to do so. Not because of the betrayal, but because even now she could not think of a single person amongst the survivors, not even the pretentious Blue Fairy, that would be willing to betray everyone like this. She closed her eyes and reached out with her magic senses to feel for the wards.

They weren't there.

In fact... it was like they'd never been there. There was no trace magic or sense that they'd been destroyed or any sign that they'd been breached through any method of force that she was familiar with. Even draining them of magic would leave some sign, some residue for her to sense. Which left only one, unfathomable option. Who was it that said it? Sherlock Holmes? When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.

The wards had been taken down. By one of the few people that had erected them in the first place. Rather than share this information with Emma, deciding to wait until the 'morning', she grabbed the woman and warned her, "We're going to Henry. Hold on."

They were surrounded by a swirl of purple smoke, and when it dissipated, they were inside the Monastery. In their little corner of it as a matter of fact, standing on the bed/mattress that they'd been allotted alongside Henry's cot. And there was Henry.

Eating what little remained of Archie.

"Oh god, no!" Emma collapsed, falling to her knees.

A part of her had known to expect this, but she'd denied it, and denial was her specialty. In all the times that they had been through this, all the times that she logically knew that Henry had been killed or turned, all the times where hers and then Regina's death meant his death, neither of them had ever witnessed their son like this. It was more than either of them could take.

"Henry?" Regina called out, tearful, hopeful, bitter and sad.

The moving corpse of the little boy that they had given birth to and raised turned and stared through them with dead, unmoving eyes that refused to focus properly. The head tilted and for a few seconds, both of them deluded themselves into thinking that he recognized them. Then the body started to lurch forward, trying to get to them. He was missing one leg.

"Oh god!" Emma bawled out, covering her mouth to keep from being sick. Neither of them were running away from this. Not from this. Not from him.

"Henry?" Regina called out again.

Emma remained on her knees on the floor. She was the closer and easier target. The corpse pulled itself up next to the weeping blond woman and opened its mouth in preparation to feast.

"It's going to be OK, kid," Emma cried, closing her eyes and pulling her baby into her arms for a final hug goodbye. "I promise. We're going to survive this. Somehow." And then be bit into her neck and started chewing an gnawing down to the very bone. She had enough time to gasp and then bled out in seconds, dead moments later, eaten by her own flesh.

"No, Emma! NO!" Regina raged suddenly and threw her arms out. Henry's body went flying, tearing out a good chunk of flesh from his mother's throat as he did so, but it didn't matter. "Oh, Henry, I'm sorry baby, Mom didn't mean to!"

The term is temporary insanity. Modern terminology has a number of different words for it these days. One of which is 'Shock'. Pretty much the brain shutting down and shutting the body down along with it.

Emma didn't rise as a zombie. Not before her undead parents shambled into the room.

"Snow," Regina said, not moving from her place at Emma's side. "How fitting that it would be you. Well, at least it wasn't zombie-wolf this time. Blue is going to pay for her treachery." She looked down and softly caressed the blond hair of the dead woman beside her. "I'll talk to you in a few minutes, Emma." Looking over, she saw the body of her little boy crawling back toward her. It was the second time she'd seen him die. She never wanted to see it again. "I'll see you soon, Henry."

And then they were on her.

_8:15 AM_

She awoke.

She lay there for about thirty seconds, trying to deal with the fact that her bedroom was still the same pristine condition that it always had been. For twenty-three plus years, nothing had changed at all. Every day was literally the same as the one before and the next one to come. Until _that woman_ came to Storybrooke.

Things had never been the same since. And since she'd broken the Curse, it had just been one crisis after the other. Some of them had been her doing, others Gold's, quite a few her mother's and then her sister's. But this... whatever this was, whoever was behind it, Regina vowed then and there, in the quiet of her bedroom of her silent and still house, that she would find them and destroy them. No matter how long it took.

Having lazed about enough for one day, she sat up and threw off the covers and began magicking everything they would need, walking straight to her phone and then the bathroom to enjoy the last peaceful shower she would have... until things started all over again.

Hitting the speed dial button, she waited for it to pick up and heard Emma's customary greeting of, "Hey Regina."

"We're running this time," she said, decision made.

Never again.

_To Be Continued...? (Leave Detailed Reviews and Criticisms please. *Constructive* criticisms work the best.)_


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